both. of them. good evening welcome to the alona show where you get the real headlines with none of the mersey we're coming live out of washington d.c. i'm lauren lyster filling in for a loaner who is on vacation but meanwhile here in d.c. the u.s. is less than a week away from d.-day is in default and what will be the price that the world the u.s. economy and politicians will pay if that happens and can it be avoided at this point we'll get the financial big picture from michael pinto he's an economist at euro

pacific capital and also get the political picture from california congressman john garamendi plus a wrongfully convicted man is freed from death row now though justice has been served after years of imprisonment what does his case tell us about police raids we will have all of that in warranted a show but first a look at what the mainstream media missed. now some u.s. counterterrorism officials officials believe the killing of osama bin laden put together with years of cia drone strikes have pushed al qaida to the brink of collapse and the mainstream media took a break from the twenty four hour he said she said of the political death debate to report on it out there on the brink of collapse you know that headline is pretty catching and as americans it's something we love to hear top u.s. officials are saying. he's on the verge of collapse the death of that group's

leader coupled with years of nonstop cia drone strikes and leaving the terror network in shambles officials caution al qaeda could rebound though and the threat of terrorism still persists especially with the growing trend of lone wolf attacks . all right. she had line that's it no questions asked let's move on we reported it resume wall to wall debt debate inside baseball political jabber that we've been running nonstop well go back to mainstream media isn't that us still and the longest war ever in afghanistan in the name of fighting al qaida and al qaida is reportedly now collapsing yet you have u.s. officials right and left saying at the same time that despite a two thousand and fourteen withdraw all date for afghanistan the u.s. may be there for many more years to come if you don't take my word for it people like outgoing u.s. ambassador to afghanistan i can bury said that recently in an interview and at the

same time the defense bill is working its way through congress which doesn't prescribe an end game either and yet signs of the consequences for america of this war are everywhere just listen to this story reported today a u.s. special operations officer his name is army master sergeant benjamin stevenson he was killed in a remote area of eastern afghanistan now this was a highly decorated soldier from texas and he was on his ten to were of duty in the war zones of afghanistan and iraq his ten two are of duty we are deploying people for ten two words of duty in this war they are dying and the mainstream media is not even questioning why not in our longest war not even when they report that this so-called enemy and now war is collapsing and the attack he died in was interestingly a fire fight against an al qaeda related group that's according to you a u.s.

official now maybe the mainstream media just didn't want this news to rain on the parade of the story of the u.s. officials reporting today the collapse of al-qaeda but never mind that back to the fact of the people that are serving nevermind the joblessness and the suicide which are rampant problems within the military in two thousand and ten for the second year in a row. more american soldiers both enlisted men and women and veterans together committed suicide then were killed in the wars in iraq and afghanistan meanwhile the national average unemployment rate for male veterans aged eighteen to twenty four who have served their country since september of two thousand and one is a staggering twenty eight percent according to recent department of labor statistics and some research and analysts tie those problems to re deployments the toll of america's longest war and questioning where that war is headed and what the costs are of the ten years hundreds of billions of dollars repeat deployments and

law i would news breaks that the enemy is on the brink of collapse that is what the mainstream media missed today. so less than a week from today the country may have began defaulting on its debts now some predict this could trigger a calamitous chain of events including everything from higher interest rates for struggling americans a loss for international investors who hold really ends of dollars and what's known as the risk free asset of u.s. bonds a loss in the u.s. is triple a credit rating aaa credit rating seniors without social security checks to live on the list goes on and on and closer to home or closer to this studio in washington the fate of many of those factors is being decided but at the eleventh hour as we have seen the debate is continuing congress and the white house are still at a stalemate in this political game of chess there is no deal while house democratic

leaders today have a message for the president they came out of the meeting saying that they want him to use the constitution to get the debt ceiling job done himself and my next guest is a lawmaker who's advocating for this as a failsafe backup plan if congress and the president can't get it all. i gather for a legislative deal joining me from capitol hill is representative john garamendi of california to explain thank you so much for being with us good to be with you and you're quite correct this is not going well here the republicans have manufactured this crisis this didn't have to happen hadn't happened in the past for about the last thirty years however they wanted to have a crisis and now we have a crisis by a crisis because they want to use this debt limit as a way of leveraging into the american public policy and laws things that they could never get any other way so now we have a crisis we're going to do my advice to the president read the constitution use the constitution solve this problem by yourself push congress aside you don't need us

and you're not going to get a resolution out of this congress it's a deadlock but the president has the power fourteenth amendment clause four we got it right there just get on with it executive order pay the bills bypass congress and get right now the president so far as being reported is that he's not going to do that on the advice of white house lawyers i want to get back to that at first i want to touch on what you said what you're blaming republicans and what the republican motivations are here i want to play a little of what house speaker house speaker john boehner said about what some members of his caucus are thinking a lot of them believe that if we get past august second we have enough chaos we could force both the senate and the white house to accept a balanced budget amendment. i want to have yeah i want to go one step further and i want to see what you think kind of playing off of something that actually donald trump said didn't the republicans want the country to default and an effort to hurt

obama's reelection campaign well senator mcconnell has been very clear about this he said this a year ago that is number one goal over the next two years was to make sure that obama was defeated and the best way to do that make sure the american economy isn't working that there is unemployment that there's jobs. there's chaos and that's precisely what boehner just said in that interview is to create chaos to force in place their vision of america they basically want to terminate the american dream and take a look at all the things they're talking about here the balanced budget amendment would take us back to the pre one thousand nine hundred sixty five establishment of medicare so medicare is gone they had their way there do away with social security or seriously modify social security cut the benefits and they clearly clearly and this was what mitch mcconnell this isn't me this is the leader of the minority party in the senate the republican leader saying his number one goal is to defeat

obama right now that you're not good for america that's not good for the world but that's what they're trying to do and president obama has said time and time again that default would be a disaster so why do you think he wouldn't use the constitution to just get they've done if both default and his reelection are threatened well i think he doesn't want to do it it would be the first time ever that it had been done obviously it takes the hand it takes the ball out of the court of congress and gives the president that. that ball to carry and it's a hot potato or hot ball and you know who wants that well i'm afraid mr president you may not have any choice but to pick this one up and carry it and i think frankly i'd be good for the nation and it be good for him and for us in congress who are looking at this understanding what the republicans want to do and that is to destroy the obama presidency we're saying don't count on congress getting this done the republicans in the house are determined to either use this point as

a lever to get terrible policies in place that would destroy medicare destroyed medicaid and all of the programs that try to lift up americans so that they can achieve the american dream of climbing the economic ladder the republicans at least some. there are determined to do that so where are we going to go well if you can't do it here mr president don't count on don't count on the republicans are not going to allow this to be done the prepared and we'll get the executive order written and on monday night or sunday night simply sign it and say america is not going to default i've taken the authority given to me in the fourteenth amendment and i'm using out authority we are paying our bills this instructs the treasury department pay the bills ok i want to ask you do you think that would really help the longer term than what we've seen which has been a political stalemate a political debate that has gone on and on and eleventh hour with de fall it's

hanging in the balance and some believe they you know status get settled say the president does this it just pushes the can down the road to september when federal funding expires they have to revisit that issue are we just going to see another huge debate more political brinksmanship it takes the focus away from other issues for example jobs well nobody wants more than i to get back to the jobs that gender and we're going to do that we're promoting the make it in america john an agenda that does have a potential if we can pass the various pieces of legislation to really rebuild the american manufacturing sector for example creating an infrastructure bank where we can pool the assets of various pension funds across the nation both public and private and some federal money to rebuild our infrastructure to build our streets roads transportation systems sanitation systems water systems those are putting people back to work and also making it in america and china that says use our tax

money to buy american made equipment why in the world we would give a tax subsidy our tax money to a manufacturer of solar cells in china i don't understand if we're going to put up solar cells if we're going to put up wind turbines and use american taxpayer money to do. by those literally by those that must be american made equipment and so there are things that we can do and we're going to push that agenda but you're also correct that we should look forward to every critical moment in the next eighteen months that the republicans will use that moment you mentioned the september thirteenth first deadline for the new appropriation for the fiscal year two thousand and twelve yes they're going to use that moment to try to put in place their radical agenda to take america back to the nineteen fifties and sixties they're going to do it we need to be prepared for that we also need on our side to have a very strong correct deficit reduction program so let me ask you about that i want

to touch on that because i don't want to get too into entitlements but you mentioned you're very concerned about cuts to them i also very concerned about the deficit and you're concerned about the full faith and credit of the united states as insured by the credit rating and raising the debt ceiling and all of that so my question to you is how do you i cheat having the full faith and credit of the united states for the united states if you don't rein in entitlements because i mean they are and they mount to sixty one trillion dollars by as a matter on the low side that are unfunded so how can you ever share the things you want without rain as in. put a four letter word t.-i m.-e. into that equation when has it become a problem social security social security is the federal government's cash cow social security is running a surplus we're using social security to finance the federal government have been for a long time and will continue to do so for at least a decade and probably fifteen to sixteen years out before social security has to be

changed now probably five or ten years out we ought to begin that process of change so what can we do take a look at the fact that social security taxes a very very regressive tax. the first dollar you earn in america you pay six percent six and a half percent and you also add on to that the medicare which is now their percent half so it's almost eight percent of the very first dollar you use but after you get past one hundred seven thousand dollars you don't pay anything all right you want to deal with social security index that tax so that when you go to one hundred fifty two hundred three hundred thousand dollars you continue to pay his seven or eight percent so if i sell you a little sister isn't it going at the benefit is so essentially there is a longer debate to be had that you say that this has a base i mean it can be pushed further down the road in favor of settling with today i want to thank you for weighing in on those things that we didn't get to the war which is something that you've named is a problem and it's also

a big ticket item that the u.s. government spends a lot it's one of the piece you want to solve this budget you've got to deal with the military expenditures and the war and the base budget of the military and we want to thank you so much for being on the stand that's a whole other topic but one that has a lot of reason to talk about it thank you. now we have more on the debate over raising the debt ceiling next we just have the political angle but what would happen if washington doesn't act will there be a global depression we're going to cover the issue with michael and the senior economist in europe at the capital into nothing. into that only a military mechanism to go to bring justice or accountability. no i have every right to know what my government should do if you want to know why i pay taxes. but i would characterize obama as a charismatic version of american exceptionalism.

you know sometimes you see a story and it seems so for like sleep you think you understand it and then he glimpse something else you hear see some of the part of it and realize that everything is ok you don't know i'm sorry the big picture. says. let's not forget that we had an apartheid regime right here and. i think iraq is evil and want to quell. whatever government says they're going to keep him safe get ready because the air

freed up four. for . now this afternoon reports were flying out of the u.k. when scotland yard an ounce they've captured the spokesman for the hacking group now according to the associated press

a nineteen year old who goes by the nickname topiary was arrested in scotland shetland islands in a press release from metro police it states the man arrested is believed to be linked to an ongoing international investigation into the criminal activity of the so-called have to visit groups gone amiss and will sec now we should know that was the spokesperson for anonymous and eventually moved on to represent the offshoot organization which is of course lulz sec and in fact topiary has been featured on this program back in december alone interviewed him when he represented anonymous and he explained to us why anonymous made a target out of companies like pay pal visa and master card. these companies. paper for example funding we can reach they took the phones from wiki leaks and they refused to give them they have given them but you know but we believe this was not really an addict do they want to do they were forced to do it and we're not a malicious group we were doing this for a reason we're doing the movement for

a reason for the freedom of information and speech. and paul speaking of pay pal the hacktivists anon and those security are going old school with a new campaign against the site and rather than trying to get people to crash it with a d.d. o. s. style attack they're calling on others to boycott the online money service in a statement the hacktivist say the first step to being truly free is not putting one's trust into a company that freezes accounts when it feels like it or when it's pressured by the u.s. government now like topiary mentioned in our interview months ago pay pal has suspended funding for wiki leaks so the groups launched operation pay pal back then in response so has the boycott now worked well reporting that stock which owns paper of course went down a billion dollars in a matter of hours and if you look at the stock today compared to yesterday the price was down more than three percent at the close shot down a look at that so could boycotts become the new preferable ambo for anonymous and those that perhaps this could be the best way to keep hackers out of jail we've

seen the government crackdown on anonymous and let the people do the protesting on their own without getting access to servers or systems like they've done in the past with their d.d. o. s. attacks it does point to the power of the people we have to point out and the power of hacktivists to continue to inspire the people even with a more hands off approach all the hacktivists have done is promoted and encouraged to movement no attacks no hacking just asking people to do what they can to stand up for free and open information after all the police can't rightfully arrest anyone for boycotting for now we hope. now though the debt debate the debt over the debate the debate over the debt. dummy data that's in debate right now over do you fall is being decided in washington economists say the effects will be felt worldwide now that the mainstream media may be focused on the political posturing and the back and forth much more than the re-election campaigns as some of those politicians are on the line here in the u.s.

dollar as the global reserve currency china owns more than a trillion dollars and u.s. debt they have asked for reassurance over these last weeks and months and this debate extends far beyond the beltway as those examples show so what is really at stake here the full faith and credit of the united states or has the world really accepted that a downgrade to u.s. credit rating the aaa rating and a bigger threat to the u.s. credit is the growing heap of debt which many say is impossible to pay back michael pinto he's a senior economist at euro pacific capital he said help us figure it out thank you for being here listen to you you love how we try to tell you how you do i said you love me oh you're trying to help me ok that's. ok you were the you're my wife is that ok well let's talk about the debt then the day is now less than a week away default congress the white house still can't agree on the deal so what happens next week if the country defaults who feels that pain ok so you know what i

think unfortunately. as the problem of getting this route is that the u.s. will default on her going to come august second this is a bunch of malarkey there's plenty of revenue coming into the government coffers to pay the interest on our day that's the only thing creditors should be concerned no there's things they can be concerned also is that the u.s. will spangly get fiscal house in order. to bring the debt ceiling ceiling. to the last decade back up if the u.s. pays the end on the debt. he doesn't get paid if the debt ceiling isn't raised. as a would to me gator wants to do we could not pay defense you could cut social security it's cut medicare but these problems are insolvent and need to be cut that's the whole point is i don't know what i did too much if we had

a deal done like the gang of six or perhaps. we cut maybe six trillion in spending and we finally got the entitlements under control with a slight increase in taxes i am really not for that but you can get that done i said for months i was the only person on planet earth to admit this to anybody in public that the us was in keep of tackling it's in title means in the scope and duration between then and august second so now hoping maybe there's a thirty percent chance of some stopgap measure but that will bring it down from s. and p. moody's and fitch the united states for now you're saying that way back in a matter of going to live is interesting us bonds are interest rates going to go up up but listen there's no reason why anybody would listen to you s. and p. reserve fish with big hair around i'll tell you the chinese care about the chinese terrible bit about the us capping our dead. ceiling we have

worked hundred point three trillion right now total debt outstanding. we need to cap that if we tease our debt ceiling by one unnaturally in dollars per annum as we have been doing this really a little weavings will come from china japan and europe and then you have to guess they know what if you get another and then you have just ben. and he's pretty impress ok the treasury gazans which is why we're germany which is argentina which is bosnia which is georgia we can't afford the united states so this. not be the prettiest way to go about it but we are finally forcing the united states to deal with it and that is good news in the long term ok let me ask you this i want to touch on the long term thing but you are in finance i'm assuming you have a pretty comfortable life i'm assuming that if there is

a partial default and the united states began to only paying the interest on the people that owes on its bonds and those payments its creditors and starts sending out social security checks or as a guard setting out veterans' benefits that you won't have that correct lauren. that's right there. for you to argue isn't it laura i have a father and i'm not you know i am a libertarian but i'm a libertarian at the very very big court you show you that the question is see you're you're changing the sign on so you're taking the side which means what you're saying because. after you possibly cut him it's not because you're going to cut one hundred percent of no cure. short. supply funds but here's the point we have no choice you're assuming perhaps we should give these people these programs are insolvent the unfunded liabilities amount to one

hundred and fifteen trillion dollars you're going to have to tell me if you really believe we're going to be either democrat or republican that we have the money to pay for these entitlement programs they must be cut now we can even out it's going to raise the debt ceiling and to continue to to pay social security and tell you to pay these things right now ok but i reckon. can you assure me that what happened in greece is going to happen to america in two thousand and twelve two thousand and thirteen now i get a very i can assure you that i'm curious why now and that's very sure to make outlining a partial default but america. to be heard. chris lawrence greece was humming along nicely one hundred percent that judy paying about one percent of their not the reserve currency there are very good characterizations a reference a. lot of you're saying is that you're getting your data back in maybe three

hundred fifty eight he goes around saying we're only civilized country on the planet so we possibly for that's the best you can my case i'm not saying that all i'm asking the questions you're comparing to greece i'm pointing out a difference that i can assure you this sixty three percent of foreign currency reserves are in dollars four years old fifty four percent of our publicly traded if we have the worship me up on a little down market investors that the u.s. can no longer be trusted as the euro currency and the u.s. can't be trusted to pay back or get you're going to have such a nice of russia isn't that greece and japan they're going to have to worry about. the reserve currency are you going to tell you this say to me that the chinese are going to watch their holdings go down that you and watched your reviewers rise and

prices plummet and you're sitting on hands you can't assure you i can assure you that i get a story that you're right but we don't know we don't know just like we don't know what will happen if the u.s. arsenal defaults are totally default but i want to ask you about jobs because that obviously is a huge issue and the united states unemployment is more than nine percent the average for a cent of unemployment is nine months many people can't get work and you mentioned long term what needs to happen cutting the debt and a lot of people believe in your camp of people that say have arguments similar to yours is that what's needed it's a cap a debt in order to provide for that long term job growth my question is you know what happens now how do people now get jobs. we have nine point two percent. are you saying that the reason why we haven't done one is because we raise the debt ceiling now i'm out we knew stuart's term what happens to joblessness if we do. get for top spending and greyness and impose austerity in the short term there is very

painful i am not tonight i'm saying take your medicine now before you have to take a very and much larger pill down the road this is economics this is not a matter it's this is very very simple if you do the numbers you read group over right or wrong or if you do your history of eight hundred years of the fall on the sovereign debt level you know this is going to happen i mean for for anyone to tell me the u.s. is different you could look at the ballots and the laws of physics and the rest of the economics are indeed universal all right in their universe only painful it sounds like according to your theory i want to thank you for giving it to me i hope you still love me after that interview no i'm only kidding but thanks so much for being on the show thank you for. stepping right there corey may his story he spent years in prison after shooting a police officer there at a no knock warrant case but he was recently free events night we're going to.